In 1991, Winnie Mandela was convicted of being an accessory in the assault of four youths who had been kidnapped and taken to her Soweto, South Africa, home in 1988.

In 1992, astronauts from the shuttle Endeavor made an unprecedented three-man spacewalk to salvage an errant communications satellite.

In 1994, U.S. President Bill Clinton nominated Judge Stephen Breyer to succeed Justice Harry A. Blackmun on the U.S. Supreme Court.

In 1998, as India conducted more nuclear test blasts, U.S. President Bill Clinton announced he would impose economic sanctions against New Delhi as required by the 1994 Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Act.

In 2002, the sex abuse scandal involving Roman Catholic clergy grew violent when a Baltimore priest accused of molesting a youth years earlier was shot by the alleged victim. The following day, a Connecticut priest hanged himself at a Maryland treatment center for priests accused of molestation.

Also in 2002, U.S. President George Bush signed a bill that would increase federal payments to farmers by at least $83 billion over 10 years. Congressional critics called it a budget buster.

And, Bush announced that he and Russian President Putin would sign a treaty committing the United States and Russia to a two-thirds reduction in their nuclear arsenal over 10 years.

In 2003, suicide bombers, in four coordinated attacks, killed 34 people in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

In 2005, Colombian authorities said they made the biggest drug bust in the nation's history when they grabbed 12 tons of cocaine valued at $300 million.

Also in 2005, government troops in Uzbekistan put down an uprising they blame on Islamic militants. Opponents say the troops fired into crowds and killed hundreds of people.

In 2006, health officials said the virulent bird flu that raised fears of a human pandemic mostly had been snuffed out in Southeast Asia where it claimed its first victims.

In 2007, Hamas and Fatah gunmen traded gunfire in Gaza, killing at least two people after a weekend of renewed factional Palestinian fighting. Within a few days, 40 Palestinians were reported dead from violent exchanges.

Also in 2007, U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said if the Iraqi Parliament votes to ask the United States to leave Iraq, "We'll be glad to comply."

A thought for the day: E.B. White wrote, "The trouble with the profit system has always been that it was highly unprofitable to most people."

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